Aussies flocking to social media
NEW research shows almost eight in 10 Australians are now logging on to social media, with many senior citizens giving the Facebook thumbs up.
The Sensis social media report found 99 per cent of 18-29 year olds are now using social media, although the biggest jumps this year were in the 30-39 age group (up 14 points to 96 per cent usage) and the 40-49 age group (up 16 points to 86 per cent usage).
Twenty-year-old Rachael Kubeil says she logs on to either Instagram, Facebook or Snapchat multiple times every day. Younger people are now starting to move away from Facebook as it becomes “greyer” with Ms Kubeil nominating Instagram as her favourite social media site.
“A lot of people’s attitudes to social media have changed,” the Deakin nursing student said. “I have aunties and uncles on Facebook that wouldn’t have been interested in social media two or three years ago.”
Psychologist Andrew Fuller said smartphones have had a huge impact on Australian society during the past decade, from the way we communicate to the simple act of walking down the street.
“There are families now that change their holiday plans because the destination doesn’t have internet access,” he said. “There’s been a mass- ive shift in the way we act and communicate over the past few years. You only have to walk down the street to see people looking at their phones, whereas before they’d be looking in the shop windows, looking at people passing by.”
Sydney Medical School academic Nick Glozier warned of the addictive qualities of the social media revolution.
“Excessive social media use may be rewiring people’s brains, with every like or retweet acting as a reward and re- leasing small doses of dopamine that leave us happy,” he said. “As a result we adapt our behaviour to chase further chemical rewards within the brain, and feel craving like symptoms and anxiety when we can’t get them.”